It is well known that a considerable amount of electric energy is required by the illumination demands of a modern society resulting from the requirements for controlled highly illuminated environments. In spite of the advances in technology and current efficiency of gas discharge lamps, which are 80% more efficient than traditional incandescent lamps, additional savings in energy usage can be achieved by utilizing external devices. The measure of efficiency is Lumens per Watt (Lm/W), where Lumens is the measure of light generation and Watts represents the power input to the system to produce a given amount of light. A number of efforts have been made with external devices to the lamp as follows:
a) Increasing the efficiency (Lm/W) utilizing an electronic ballast to provide power to the lamp, resulting in considerable energy savings of approximately 21%, as compared to traditional electromagnetic ballasts. PA1 b) Fixtures or devices with parabolic reflectors, with high gain aluminum plating that allow one to sensibly reduce the number of lamps that are needed for an installation, in comparison with the installation of older generation lights without such reflectors. PA1 c) There also exists an Argentine patent for a device, No. 249642 (1996), which achieves the recycling (reflection) of ultraviolet radiation by use of a reflector specifically designed for ultraviolet radiation, thus attaining an increase in visible light.
All of these devices and improvement alleviate the critical situation that is presented by the increase in the consumption of energy for illumination and the consequent environmental impact.
The invention which is the subject of this Specification, is based on the creation of an "auto-generated electrical field" around the mercury discharge gas lamp and/or common fluorescent tube which greatly improves the Lm/W efficiency ratio. This invention also contributes to improving the mercury lamps' other discharge characteristics by reducing, by more than 70%, the ultraviolet radiation from the light spectrum that reaches the work surface, thus contributing to alleviating the environmental impact and the human health hazards related to ultraviolet radiation.